So good news: The car is now legal to drive. Registration/inspection wasn't too bad, even though I kind of did it last minute. Procedure is basically: get your VIN (they now require photos), Talk to insurance people about getting getting insurance to drive it from home to the shop (they didn't know how to do it, and had to phone in), drive car to the shop, get inspected, they install VIN, drive car to insurance place, they inspect that VIN is there and you're done. You do need to buy a day-permit after though as the insurance you had was ONLY for inspection purposes. I ran into a couple of issues due to timing, but that was just me doing things too quickly. When talking with people the key word is "hotrod". Once they hear that, things go smoother.
So carwise, I've put about 3.5hrs on it. Nothing has fallen off or blown up yet so I'm pretty happy. Car feels decent so far but have some things to improve. The two main issues are brakes (They work. But not well enough for racing. Next step is a smaller M/C) and clutch (For some reason it is slipping under load. I'll try to bed it in better and drive easy for a while). When the clutch grips, the car definitely has some acceleration and traction. The car is/was also ridiculously loud. I've stuffed some gigantic mufflers on it to make it more driveable. Steering ratio feels decent. I think once I put a smaller wheel on there, I may be fine. Need to do a proper alignment on it as my caster is out to lunch. Power is smooth and throttle is forgiving. I haven't really chucked it around yet, but so far handling is reasonable. Will have to see what the balance is like. Car feels well connected to the road, but usually not harsh. It sure feels weird driving the Yaris after though.....
So the bad news (why is there always bad news?!): I can't drive the damn thing
I have a hernia which doesn't like manual brakes/steering. And getting in/out is not good either. So until that is sorted, the car is grounded. I can't really work on it either, and honestly am not that interested. No point if you can't drive it. Also, for the last year or so the main push was to get it done so that my Grandpa could see it. He and I were very close, and he wanted to see the car driving. I snuck it up to his house a few months ago and he was able to see it running/driving; Which was great. He did pass away a few weeks later, so I'm very glad he was able to see it. The flip side is I'm still not that interested in working on the car.
Anyway, long story short I'm glad the car is "done". After healing, the next step will be getting brakes/clutch sorted, get it quiet enough for autoX and then see what it does. Probably won't be until next summer though. I do also have to say thanks to a buddy Rick; He has helped me a HUGE amount with the bodywork. Without his help there is no way it would have been done in time for my Grandpa to see it.
Cheers.
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